Sheaffer

Sheaffer Pen Corporation ^[1]

Type	Subsidiary
Industry	Writing instruments
Founded	1912
Founder(s)	Walter Sheaffer
Headquarters	Shelton, Connecticut, US
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Tim Williams (General Manager) [2]
Products	Fountain and ballpoint pens
Net income	$ 36 million [1]
Employees	250 [1]
Website	www.sheaffer.com

Sheaffer Pen Corporation (ʃeɪfɜː) is a manufacturer of writing instruments, particularly luxury fountain pens. The company was founded by Walter A. Sheaffer in Fort Madison, Iowa, and incorporated in 1913 ^[3] to exploit his invention of a lever-filling fountain pen. The brand is currently a subsidiary of French company Bic.

History

Sheaffer has manufactured fountain pens down to the present day. The original lever-filler mechanism remained in use through the end of the 1940s, though a sacless plunger design was introduced in the early 1930s. In 1949 Sheaffer adopted the "Touchdown" pneumatic-filling mechanism for its top-line fountain pens. A development of the Touchdown design was the Snorkel, which added a small extendable tube underneath the nib to avoid the need to dip the nib into ink when operating the filler plunger. The last Snorkel pen was the oversize "Pen For Men", a fat-bodied model introduced in 1959 with the then-new "Inlaid Nib" which has since featured on all Sheaffer's top-of-the-range pens.

From the 1950s Sheaffer pens were designed to accept ink cartridges or a converter to allow the use of bottled ink. The Targa was a popular premium model which came in around 80 different finishes and two sizes (classic and slim). Current premium pens in the range include the Valor and the Legacy series, all of which retain the inlaid nib.

Products

Sheaffer manufactures a variety of products, including rollerballs and mechanical pencils as well as luxury fountain and ballpoint pens.^[4] Recently, in 2013, they have launched collection of Ferrari special edition ball point, fountain and roller ball pens.

Notes and references

External links

• Official website